Multi-All! - Now Think On This by Steve Martin

Multi-All!

Now Think On This

Steve Martin

  

“…and he made him a varicolored tunic.” (Genesis 37:3-4, NASU)

Talk about writing some good news! The Charlotte Observer (Charlotte, North Carolina) finally did it this morning on their Sunday, October 22, 2017 front page. I personally rarely read that newspaper by the way, with its anti-bent slant on most of the many things which I stand for in this life. But thanks Tim Funk. You did good.

What was the article about, filling almost a full page? How Elevation Church (Steven Furtick) is becoming more and more multi-racial, multi-cultural, and multi-generational. Multi-ALL!

Being a light to the nations has to begin with how we join with each other - to be that which we have been called to be. Joining together black, white, Jew and Gentile, to be the Body of Messiah. Why else did the Creator choose to create all kinds that He has? And no wonder there are so many Chinese! The Lord Jesus loves them so much!

When it comes to doing the right thing, the churches in our nations better be taking the lead. You want racism dealt with? Better have a multi-racial gathering Sunday mornings in your church.

Want the Millennials to gain some wisdom, especially from the Golden Oldies (like me!)? Join together in church and small group gatherings.

Looking for a place that, wow! Even Jews, Gentiles, and anyone in between (is there such a one?) celebrate life? Use our synagogues and churches as a place that all can worship the Living God of Israel together. (And no, there is no other god above Him.)

I grew up in Waterloo, Iowa. Went to a parochial Catholic high school (Columbus High). Of the 1100 students from 9^th-12^th grade, there were many 15 black kids. Racial tension was often present, with the “West Side” and the “East Side”. But I was friends with at least half of them whom I personally knew. They were good kids.

And then I married a German Lutheran 18-year old girl! (Her father's name was Otto Unzicker. Loved him and still do. See you in heaven Otto!)

(Photo: Otto with his Bethlehem Bell painting after his trip to Israel in the late 1980's.)

If we are going to be the answer to the racial tension in our cities, our schools, and even within many churches, believers have to take the lead and do what the Lord Jesus, Yeshua, commanded us to do. Love our neighbors as ourselves. And yes, my neighborhood neighbor next door is black. Single mother Tracey, her son Diesel and mom are originally from Atlanta. I have mowed their yard occasionally being she works two jobs.

Do we practice what we so often preach? Check out this photo of our band in 2001.

Steve Martin & The Raiders 2001 – white, black, Native American, male and female! 

Old and bearded too!

How about this photo above from 2013? The Ahava Love Band with Jew (Gid Anthony - guitar) black man (Ron Bowen - drums), the Islands! (Wane Daroux - bass guitar), keyboard and singers (Patty Paquette and Laurie Martin - white females) and then me. The old man!

Wane Daroux (bass guitar) - Love the smile as he looks at Ron Bowen on drums.

In order to fight the ungodly spirit of racism, the anti-Semitic overtures in many countries, and the young versus old culture that is blasted out from almost every front, believers need to be the ones to show it right, get it right, and do it right.

If you haven’t got a friend who doesn’t look like you, talk like you, eat like you, or speak like you, then maybe it is about time you get one. That is the Plan He has set forth. Hear and obey what He knows and has desired since the day His family revealed themselves to us, as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Got it?

Shalom and ahava (peace and love in Hebrew).

Now think on this,

Steve Martin
Founder/President
Love For His People, Inc.




Meet some of my other friends.

Steve, Jodie Goodman, Edgar & Indira Persad.

My boss: Greek lady Eleni Saunders, former co-worker Jovanna Mozeak and myself

My friend Louie from Jaffa Gate, Jerusalem Israel. - Gift shop owner (photo May 2017)

IDF soldiers at the Friends of Zion museum in Jerusalem, Israel May 2017

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Now Think On This - in the Year of our Lord 10.22.17 - #325 – “Multi-All”, Sunday, 8:30 am

Watch my video I recorded that in the day on this message.
Click here: Multi-ALL

In Charlottesville, the Local Jewish Community Presses On - ALAN ZIMMERMAN REFORMJUDAISM.ORG

In Charlottesville, the Local Jewish Community Presses On

BY ALAN ZIMMERMAN   ReformJudaism.org 

At Congregation Beth Israel in Charlottesville, VA, we are deeply grateful for the support and prayers of the broader Reform Jewish community. Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of Heather Heyer and the two Virginia State Police officers, H. Jay Cullen and Berke Bates, who lost their lives on Saturday, and with the many people injured in the attack who are still recovering.

The loss of life far outweighs any fear or concern felt by me or the Jewish community during the past several weeks as we braced for this Nazi rally – but the effects of both will each linger.

On Saturday morning, I stood outside our synagogue with the armed security guard we hired after the police department refused to provide us with an officer during morning services. (Even the police department’s limited promise of an observer near our building was not kept — and note, we did not ask for protection of our property, only our people as they worshipped). 

Forty congregants were inside. Here’s what I witnessed during that time.

For half an hour, three men dressed in fatigues and armed with semi-automatic rifles stood across the street from the temple. Had they tried to enter, I don’t know what I could have done to stop them, but I couldn’t take my eyes off them, either. Perhaps the presence of our armed guard deterred them. Perhaps their presence was just a coincidence, and I’m paranoid. I don’t know.

Several times, parades of Nazis passed our building, shouting, “There's the synagogue!” followed by chants of “Seig Heil” and other anti-Semitic language. Some carried flags with swastikas and other Nazi symbols.

A guy in a white polo shirt walked by the synagogue a few times, arousing suspicion. Was he casing the building, or trying to build up courage to commit a crime? We didn’t know. Later, I noticed that the man accused in the automobile terror attack wore the same polo shirt as the man who kept walking by our synagogue; apparently it’s the uniform of a white supremacist group. Even now, that gives me a chill.

When services ended, my heart broke as I advised congregants that it would be safer to leave the temple through the back entrance rather than through the front, and to please go in groups.

This is 2017 in the United States of America.

Later that day, I arrived on the scene shortly after the car plowed into peaceful protesters. It was a horrific and bloody scene.

Soon, we learned that Nazi websites had posted a call to burn our synagogue. I sat with one of our rabbis and wondered whether we should go back to the temple to protect the building. What could I do if I were there? Fortunately, it was just talk – but we had already deemed such an attack within the realm of possibilities, taking the precautionary step of removing our Torahs, including a Holocaust scroll, from the premises.

Again: This is in America in 2017. 

At the end of the day, we felt we had no choice but to cancel a Havdalah service at a congregant’s home. It had been announced on a public Facebook page, and we were fearful that Nazi elements might be aware of the event. Again, we sought police protection – not a battalion of police, just a single officer – but we were told simply to cancel the event.

Local police faced an unprecedented problem that day, but make no mistake, Jews are a specific target of these groups, and despite nods of understanding from officials about our concerns – and despite the fact that the mayor himself is Jewish – we were left to our own devices. The fact that a calamity did not befall the Jewish community of Charlottesville on Saturday was not thanks to our politicians, our police, or even our own efforts, but to the grace of God.

And yet, in the midst of all that, other moments stand out for me, as well.

John Aguilar, a 30-year Navy veteran, took it upon himself to stand watch over the synagogue through services Friday evening and Saturday, along with our armed guard. He just felt he should.

We experienced wonderful turnout for services both Friday night and Saturday morning to observe Shabbat, including several non-Jews who said they came to show solidarity (though a number of congregants, particularly elderly ones, told me they were afraid to come to synagogue).                                                                                                                         

A frail, elderly woman approached me Saturday morning as I stood on the steps in front of our sanctuary, crying, to tell me that while she was Roman Catholic, she wanted to stay and watch over the synagogue with us. At one point, she asked, “Why do they hate you?” I had no answer to the question we’ve been asking ourselves for thousands of years.

At least a dozen complete strangers stopped by as we stood in front the synagogue Saturday to ask if we wanted them to stand with us.

And our wonderful rabbis stood on the front lines with other Charlottesville clergy, opposing hate.

Most attention now is, and for the foreseeable future will be, focused on the deaths and injuries that occurred, and that is as it should be. But for most people, before the week is out, Saturday’s events will degenerate into the all-to-familiar bickering that is part of the larger, ongoing political narrative. The media will move on — and all it will take is some new outrageous Trump tweet to change the subject.

We will get back to normal, also. We have two B'nai mitzvah coming up, and soon, Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur will be upon us, too.                                                                                                          

After the nation moves on, we will be left to pick up the pieces. Fortunately, this is a very strong and capable Jewish community, blessed to be led by incredible rabbis. We have committed lay leadership, and a congregation committed to Jewish values and our synagogue. In some ways, we will come out of it stronger – just as tempering metals make them tougher and harder.

Alan Zimmerman is the president of Congregation Beth Israel in Charlottesville, VA.

Published: 8/14/2017

CATEGORIES: Jewish Life, Jewish Life Around the World, Practice, What is Reform Judaism?

TAGS:

congregational life, Jewish living, jewish values, anti-Semitism, current events

Mennonite Church USA Adopts BDS (anti-Semitic) with 98% Vote - JMI Media

Mennonites

Mennonite Church USA Adopts 

BDS (anti-Semitic) with 98% Vote 

 13 Tammuz 5777 – July 7, 2017 JMI Media

Culminating a three-year process, delegates at the Mennonite Church USA assembly in Orlando on Thursday adopted a resolution titled “Seeking Peace in Israel and Palestine,” with approximately 98 percent voting in favor. The resolution calls on members to “avoid purchase of products associated with the occupation or produced in settlements in occupied territories.” It also establishes a process for the church to review its investments “for the purpose of withdrawing investments from companies that are profiting from the occupation.”

Perhaps in response to anticipated accusations of anti-Semitic motives, the press release issued by the Mennonite Church reported that “the resolution also calls on Mennonites to examine the legacy of anti-Semitism in their own history and life. It commends plans for several conferences in the next biennium on topics including Mennonite involvement in the Holocaust and examining how the church reads scripture in light of the Holocaust. The resolution encourages Mennonites at different levels of church life to strengthen and build relationships with Jewish communities.”

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At the Mennonite Church USA delegate assembly in Kansas City in 2015, delegates tabled a resolution favoring BDS and asked that it be revised and brought back to the next delegate gathering. A three-person writing team and a 10-member reference group “worked intensely during the past two years, consulting widely across the church and with Palestinian and Jewish partners.”

“I could not support the resolution two years ago. It was too simplistic,” Mennonite World Conference president Nelson Kraybill said, speaking in support of the motion during comments at the microphones. “I commend the committee for their thorough work.”

Kraybill was referring to countless expressions of good, Christian guilt regarding the treatment of Jews, which peppers the new, anti-Israel resolution. Segments like this one:

Confession and Lament

As Western Christians, Mennonites, and U.S. citizens, we confess and lament the ways we have participated in harms against Jewish people:

 Failing to do the hard work of examining our participation in antisemitic belief and practice
 Bearing complicity in the Holocaust that killed six million Jews, failing to respond to Jewish refugees fleeing Europe, and failing to fully examine the historic record of Mennonite complicity in these atrocities
 Ignoring the gravity of ongoing antisemitism and acts of violence against Jewish people
 Failing to recognize how these past and present threats contribute to the need for security for Jewish people
 Neglecting to build relationships with Jewish representatives and communities in the United States and to recognize diverse expressions of their hopes and fears
 Failing to understand the significance of the state of Israel for many Jewish people and the diversity of perspectives and understandings among Jews related to Israel and Zionism.

And, now that we got this off our communal chest, let’s boycott Israel…

“This resolution offers a unique Mennonite voice,” according to the resolution. “It opposes Israeli military occupation and US support while intentionally affirming the need to reach out to build stronger relationships with Jewish communities.”

While omitting all references to Muslim Arab terrorism in Judea and Samaria and Gaza against both Jews and Christians, the resolution strikes a strong sci-fi chord when it “strongly affirms Palestinian and Israeli advocates of nonviolence.”

They don’t mention those “Palestinian advocates of non-violence” by name.

Is it time for the US to resign from the Human Rights Council? - Yossi Aloni ISRAEL TODAY

Is it time for the US to resign from the Human Rights Council?

Wednesday, March 22, 2017 |  Yossi Aloni  ISRAEL TODAY

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Israel is working to persuade the Trump government to withdraw from the UN Human Rights Council, and Deputy Prime Minister Michael Oren has begun a campaign to persuade the US to quit the council he calls an "anti-Semitic body."

Oren spoke yesterday with Deputy Secretary of State Erin Berkley, who earlier this month addressed the council in Geneva and called on them to stop their obsession with Israel. The United States is one of 47 council members and their three-year membership is due to end in 2019. "The US government headed by Donald Trump is examining his participation in the UN human rights body in order to promote a reform that will lead to a more balanced agenda that will end the organization's obsession with Israel. In order for the Council to have any credibility, and especially in order to succeed in its role, it must abandon its unbalanced and ineffective positions. When we look at our continued conduct, my administration will consider the Council's actions with a view to reform - in order to achieve the Council's goals of protecting and promoting human rights, "Berkeley said.

Berkeley added: "The United States continues to be very concerned about its consistent, unfair and unbalanced focus on one democratic state, Israel. At present, North Korea and Iran are denying millions of people the right to freedom of religion, belief, assembly, freedom of association and freedom of expression. "The obsession with Israel is the greatest threat to the credibility of the Council. It limits the good we can achieve by making this council a mockery. The United States will oppose any effort to delegitimize or isolate Israel. Not only in the Human Rights Council, but everywhere it happens. When it comes to human rights, no country should be free from criticism, but there should not be a situation in which a democratic state is always judged unfairly, unbalanced or based on unfounded prejudices."

"I very much hope that some of the changes in foreign policy and policy toward Israel in particular will be one of the changes that the US will stop legitimizing for a body that is not only anti-Israel but also anti-Semitic," said Oren. Berkeley replied to Oren that the administration was considering exiting the body. Oren said, "I certainly enjoyed a sympathetic ear."

In addition, Oren held a number of discussions on the subject with members of Congress. US Secretary of State Tillerson also published an article on the subject in which he said that the US demands reforms from the Council otherwise the US will leave.

The Bush administration withdrew its ambassador from the council in 2006 partly because of the anti-Israel nature of the council. Obama returned the ambassador and refused Israeli demands to withdraw him on the grounds that the American presence on the council could change the council from within.

Michael Oren believes that it is precisely the American presence that legitimizes a body that is fundamentally anti-Israeli. "The Americans did not succeed during the Obama administration in bringing about any change for us in the council, and our situation has only deteriorated," he added.

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Joel C. Rosenberg: 69 bomb threats to Jewish Community Centers since January 1. Jewish cemeteries vandalized. Anti-Semitic attacks spiking.

New post on Joel C. Rosenberg's Blog

69 bomb threats to Jewish Community Centers since January 1. Jewish cemeteries vandalized. Anti-Semitic attacks spiking. President and top leaders speak out, call for action to protect Jewish people. by joelcrosenberg A vicious wave of anti-Semitism is hitting the United States Just since the first of the year, nearly 70 Jewish Community Centers (JCCs) have received bomb threats. Jewish cemeteries have been vandalized around the country -- in St. Louis alone in recent days, more than 100 headstones in a Jewish cemetery were destroyed. Anti-Semitic attacks on American college campuses have nearly doubled, according to ADL. Jewish, Christian and Muslim leaders are speaking out, as they should. So are the President, senior administration officials and Members of Congress, denouncing these attacks and calling for action to protect the Jewish people. Over the weekend, in a show of solidarity with the suffering of the Jewish people, Vice President Mike Pence -- a devout Evangelical Christian -- took his family and advisors to the Dachau concentration camp in Germany. "Today, 11 Jewish community centers received phoned-in bomb threats," reported the JCC Association of North America. "This comes in the aftermath of three waves of bomb threats in January (Jan. 9, Jan. 18, and Jan. 31), resulting in, through today, 69 incidents at 54 JCCs in 27 states and one Canadian province in total," the JCCANA reported. "All bomb threats in both January and today have proven to be hoaxes, and all JCCs impacted have returned to regular operations." Thank God. President Trump -- whose son-in-law, Jared Kushner, is Jewish, and whose daughter, Ivanka, converted to Judaism to marry him -- has been criticized for not speaking out faster or more forcefully. But today he responded strongly, calling anti-Semitism is "horrible" and "painful" and said "we have to fight bigotry, intolerance and hatred in all its very ugly forms." “The anti-Semitic threats targeting our Jewish community and community centers are horrible, and are painful, and a very sad reminder of the work that still must be done to root out hate and prejudice and evil,” the President said, according to the New York Times. Such hate-driven attacks against Jewish people (or Muslims, or Christians, or atheists or anyone else) are so ugly and despicable. Let's be faithful in praying for them to stop, but let's also look for ways to take a stand against such hatred, and stand with -- and care for -- those who are suffering right now. [I'll provide updates in the days and weeks ahead.] [NOTE: the image is the cover of Time magazine from the summer of 2002.] ————— You can now pre-order Without Warning in hardcover, e-book and audio formats on Amazon, B&N, or any general market or Christian bookstore. It will release on March 14, 2017. Click here. Order The First Hostage today — the second in this series of political thriller about genocidal ISIS leaders plotting a terrorist attacks against Israel, Jordan and the United States — available in paperback, hardcover, e-book and audio formats. Order THE THIRD TARGET today , the first in this trilogy — now out in paperback. ———————-—- Would you like to make a secure, tax deductible investment in The Joshua Fund (www.joshuafund.net)? This is the non-profit organization Lynn and I founded in 2006 to educate and mobilize Christians to bless Israel and her neighbors in the name of Jesus, to care for the poor and needy in Israel (both Jews and Arabs) with food and other humanitarian relief, care for Holocaust survivors, care for Syrian and Iraqi refugees, and strengthen the Church in the epicenter. The Joshua Fund is a member in good standing of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability. Please click here to learn more. Thanks so much! Click here to read the 2016 Joshua Fund Donor Report — and watch the short videos, as well Subscribe (free) to the RSS feed (click here) and receive every new posting on this blog directly via email. joelcrosenberg | February 21, 2017 at 6:10 pm | Categories: Epicenter | URL: http://wp.me/piWZ7-6XD